Special Edition: What is CISPA?

Today Congress passed bill H.R. 3523, even while President Obama has promised to veto it. Being called the "Son-of-SOPA," H.R. 3523 is the new-big-and-scary-Internet-bill. H.R. 3523, AKA the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA for short) is remarkably like SOPA, but has some key differences.


While both bills would negatively affect the Internet and America's culture as a whole, CISPA focuses more on personal information and your ISP (Internet Service Provider). In short, the bill would allow your ISP (the company you pay to access the Internet) to monitor everything you do on the Internet, without your knowing, consent, or court order. Why would they do that? The bill says it would be to look for "potential threats" it would then report to the government. One of the criticisms of this is that the language is vague in what it is considered a threat. Another is that it would mean that everything you do, every blog you read, every email you read or send, every Facebook post, every picture on the Internet will be monitored and scanned to see if it mentions any trigger words.

Once your ISP knows what you're doing online, they can then share that information- including all your personal information as well like your name and address with other ISPs and the government. There is no way to opt out of this, and the ISPs will be granted immunity from privacy lawsuits. This law will supersede any and all privacy agreements you make with the ISP or any websites you visit.

Practical Tip of the Day:
Even though the bill has passed the House, it still has to pass the Senate and not be veto'ed by the President. You can find your elected officials by your zip code on this website, and can contact them in whichever means is most convenient for you. You can also see how your representative voted on this webpage.